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Blizzard's expansion into the New Zealand/Australia eSports market

Blizzard's expansion into the New Zealand/Australia eSports market

Activision Blizzard continues to push the forefront of their eSports expansion, and that now includes building a leadership team in Australia and New Zealand.

The recent announcement of Scott Bagshaw moving to Blizzard as their new Marketing Director for ANZ has been widely applauded within the industry. Bagshaw brings over 20 years of experience, including time spent with Ocean Software, Atari, Warner Home Video and Vivendi in the UK.

Bagshaw’s most noticeable career mark includes over 11 years with The Walt Disney Company, rising through the ranks to eventually serve as Head of Marketing and Commercial. He most recently joined EA Mobile as Senior Marketing Director in their Melbourne offices.

Proceeding that announcement, Blizzard is also actively seeking an eSports Manager to work at their Sydney Office (where Bagshaw will also be working at). Responsibility include developing esports plans and strategies across key Blizzard franchises, managing and operating on/offline tournaments, events or broadcasts, and maintaining exceptional relationships globally and regionally with internal teams, external partners, players, and other esports related parties.

This follows on their big splashes from last year, which included the acquisition of Major League Gaming.

Activision Blizzard has also been producing game content at an all-time rate. Hearthstone, a popular virtual card game based on World of Warcraft lore, received it’s 4th expansion in December of 2016.

Hearthstone has grown rapidly in popularity within Australia and New Zealand, and Blizzard has no doubt taken notice of that. The Hearthstone Global Games, which has a prize pool of $300,000 USD, will feature experienced teams from both Australia and New Zealand.

The continual development of Overwatch, which also launched in 2016, and their newly announced eSports league has the potential to become market leaders. Season 4 of Overwatch just launched this past week on PS4, Xbox One, and PC, with the Overwatch: Oceanic Summer Series concluding this past weekend as well.